Your
Metropolitan Washington Ear services are in grave danger of being eliminated. The
DC Government is preparing to eliminate funding for The Ear and wants to
substitute the NFB-Newsline. The Newsline is a nationally oriented news service
that uses computer generated voices, which can be difficult to understand. The
Newsline does not provide the wide range of local information or other services vital to everyday living that
are available to you through The Ear.

Following
are publications and services currently available to you through The Ear that
could be lost if the switch to Newsline is carried out:

·Weekly local food
and shopping ads

·Daily TV listings

·Local election
guides

·Local movie
theater schedules and listings of Audio Described movies in local theaters

·Schedules for
local live theaters such as Arena Stage, Ford's, National, Olney, Round House,
and Shakespeare Theatres, along with the dates of Audio Described performances
and Program Notes for each Audio Described play.

·Washingtonian and
People magazines

·ACB Reports,
Columbia Lighthouse for the Blind Newsletter, and other local community
newsletters

·African American
Magazines including Jet, Ebony, Essence, Black Enterprise, and The Journal of
Black Studies

·African American
Newspapers including Metro Herald, Afro, Washington Informer, and Final call

·International
Herald Tribune

·Heloise A-Z

·Public Service
Announcements of special interest to the Visually Impaired Community

·Daily Look Up
service

At
this critical time we ask you, our loyal DC listeners, to respond to this
imminent threat to the services provided by The Ear. We hope you will contact
officials in the DC Government immediately
to express your extreme dissatisfaction over the threatened loss of you ability
to access news and information that is vital to you. Please direct you calls,
emails, faxes or letters to the following officials:

The
contact information will be posted on our website and can be obtained from our
office staff by calling

301-681-6636.Please make your views known as soon as
possible because the proposed change could become effective as soon as January
2011– just weeks from now.

We
are privileged to have served the visually impaired residents of the District
of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia for over 36 years. We hope to be
able to continue our services to DC residents, but to do so we urgently need your
help. Please inform the DC Government how important and vital The Ear is to you
and that the elimination of our funding resulting in the loss of our services
is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. A large response is critical so we need the
help of each and every one of our DC listeners. We appreciate your
support.